If the Catholic Church, under the leadership of Pope Francis, takes the view that we are stewards of God's earth and that we have a responsibility to maintain this planet for future generations, it is not a big leap to conclude that couples should consider having smaller families.

Until the food challenge is squarely met, prudence dictates that we should be expanding domestic and international support for voluntary family planning, and in the developing world we should be promoting smaller, healthier families by educating girls, empowering women, and eliminating child marriage.

At the end of the day, these population dynamics and their consequences impact everyone. But humanists are natural leaders in the effort because humanists understand that this is the only life we'll have.

The wanted child, the planned family. Can anybody argue that the wanted child and the planned family are not infinitely better off for everyone: child, family and society in general?So why are we fighting these battles?

Just a few months ago, I'd asked a 36-year-old friend who was six months pregnant how she'd decided. "It's not that I wanted to have a baby," she'd said, "but I didn't want to regret not having had one. Everyone feels that way, right?"

I'm sorry, but I'm not sorry that we don't want kids yet. We'll have them one of these days, but for now, we're just enjoying our time learning to live with each other before we throw a little one into the mix.

In my first job in 1976, I helped college students advocate for the delivery of free birth control on their campuses. I could not have imagined then that almost four decades later, I'd once again need to be working on access to birth control methods.

I wanted to hide away in bed until it had all passed, but I had to go on. Thanksgiving needed to be celebrated, family needed to be joined and the girls needed their mom to be their mom. And therein lies the rub.

As confirmed by a recent international poll of 12,000 Catholics in 12 countries, many Catholics do not embrace the church's teachings on family planning. Many, in fact, hope that Pope Francis will relax, if not reverse, the church's longstanding opposition to the use of modern contraceptives.